PITTSBURGH – The Pitt-Bradford softball team won its fourth
Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference title in the last five
years with a 9-7 victory over Penn State Behrend on Sunday.

After losing the morning game to Behrend 6-5, the Lady Panthers
pounded out 14 hits in the deciding contest to advance to the NCAA
Division III Tournament for the third straight year. The NCAA
selection committee will announce the pairings today.

“What a great day we had,” said Tina Phillips, fourth-year head
coach at Pitt-Bradford. “This one has been the most difficult of
the past championships, but they are all special. I am sure a lot
of teams had us counted out when they saw that we were 2-14 overall
and 1-3 to start conference play, but this team clicked and we knew
that we always could win it.”

Defending champion Behrend took a 2-0 lead in the first inning
of the opener, but the Lady Panthers answered with one in the
bottom half on an RBI double by Kristy Zavinski.

It was 3-1 in the third when Michelle Kushner’s RBI single cut
the Pitt-Bradford deficit to 3-2.

After the Lady Lions extended their lead to 4-2 in the fourth,
the Lady Panthers tied the contest at 4-all in the fifth on an RBI
triple by LeeAnn Kramer and a run-scoring base hit by Jamie
Keane.

Behrend scored two more in the seventh and then Pitt-Bradford’s
rally in the home half fell one run short.

Zavinski (10-10) gave up 11 hits and three earned runs in the
loss.

“We were sloppy defensively to start the first game (five
errors) and never took advantage of our offensive opportunities,”
Phillips confessed. “When Beast (Zavinski) has to throw over a 100
pitches, it’s usually not in our favor.”

In the deciding game, the Lady Panthers (20-17) jumped out to a
6-0 advantage on an RBI single by Kramer in the first, a three-run
homer by Nicole Ewings in the third and a two-run triple by Kramer
in the fourth.

After Behrend (27-14) cut its disparity to 6-5 in the fifth, the
Lady Panthers scored three in the sixth on an RBI single by Ewings,
and RBI groundouts by Jillian Kreitzer and Tori Sanchez.

Zavinski relieved Kreitzer in the sixth and relinquished a pair
of runs, but the senior from Warren stranded two runners in the
seventh to preserve the victory for Kreitzer (8-7).

“It was great for us to come out and score right away in the
second game,” Phillips stated. “We played with the lead the whole
game, although we made it closer in the end than we needed too.
Jill (Kreitzer) gave us a great five innings and kept the top of
their order from hurting us like they did in the first game.
Ewings’ three-run homer really helped us relax a bit and LeeAnn
(Kramer) had a big triple for us.

“I can’t say enough about this team,” Phillips continued. “We
have something special here with three straight trips to the NCAA
tournament. Not a lot of teams can say that. We will enjoy this for
a while.”